Son of My Heart
by squelchything
Summary: Owen and Beru Lars reflect on their relationship with Luke during ANH.
1. Part 1: Owen

Son of My Heart 

Disclaimer: It's all Uncle George's sandpit. I am making no money from these fics; they are solely for my pleasure and that of anyone who wants to read them. All characters copyright Lucasfilm.   


You storm off to the garage, shoulders hunched, boots scuffing the sand. Those new droids back there may be more trouble than they're worth—now I have to pay for a memory wipe. Of all the astrodroids in the galaxy, I have to wind up with one belonging to Kenobi! 

I don't want that crazy wizard getting his hands on you again. I didn't mind him hanging round when you were small—not that I liked it much, even then. He said he'd promised your mother to keep an eye out for you, so I put up with it. But ever since that day you crashed you speeder up in the Jundland Waste—you were what, eleven seasons? Old enough anyway for him to fill your head full of Jedi notions, and I wouldn't stand for it. He had Anakin's lasersword with him when he hauled you and young Deak back here. Tried to give it you, but I chased him off. I'm not having him take you away to run across the galaxy on some damn-fool crusade, and so I told him. 

Jedi, indeed. Much good being a Jedi did Anakin. He was nine when they took him from Shmi, poor kid. What kind of people were they anyway, stealing a child from his mother and never letting him even write once in ten years? Maybe it's not such a bad thing they're all dead. Apart from old Ben, of course.. If they were so powerful and in tune with the Force, and all that poodoo, how come they never did anything useful, like making something grow in this desert, for instance. There's not much life out here, and isn't that what that Force of his is all about? 

Stead of that they mess around with politics. Doesn't make any difference to ordinary people like us who's in charge on the Core worlds. The Republic never bothered with Tatooine in a thousand years, and I reckon the Empire won't neither. It's all a long way from here. 

The future of the galaxy lies in his hands, Ben says to me that day. Huh. Only thing in your hands at the minute are the droids you're supposed to be cleaning—no, you're not in the garage. Off sandgathering somewhere again, head in the stars as usual. 

"Luke, I'm powering down for the night!" 

"I'll be down in a few minutes!" you yell back. Now it'll take you ten minutes to get your lazy hide into the house, if you dawdle the way you usually do. 

Not that you aren't handy enough when you put your mind to it. Bright, too. If it was your skyhopper you were working on, you'd have it done in five minutes flat. But you're too busy dreaming about flying across the galaxy or some such nonsense. Why can't you stay here where you're safe? Like Beru says, you have too much of your father in you. 

Not that I knew him really--only met him that once, but Shmi told us so much about him I felt like I did. It was a bit of a shock to see him come back all grown up, with his girlfriend and all. I guess we'd been thinking of him as still nine years old. 

But that's where you get your restlessness from, all right--the way you're always wanting to know what's over the next dune. It's why you're such a good pilot and mechanic, as well--just like Ani. 

Looks like those blasted Jedi traits bred true, as well. Else you'd have killed yourself up Beggar's Canyon long ago. You're too good just to put down to luck and young reflexes. There's the way you get hunches, sometimes, too. And the way you pick things up without being told. It's all too much just to be flukes. 

I wouldn't admit it for years, even to myself. Beru saw it before I did. I was afraid of you turning out to be Jedi. Dangerous for you and everyone else. 

You don't know it, but that's one of the reasons I didn't want you at first, all those years ago. Beru's that soft-hearted, she took one look and fell in love with you—and I will say, as babies go, you were a pretty one, all dimples and white curls and big blue eyes. Besides, by then we knew we couldn't have our own, and Beru was pining for a baby. Dad wanted to take you for Shmi's sake— and I did feel that myself. She was a good woman, your grandmother, and we were fond of each other. I wasn't her Ani and she wasn't my mother, but we understood that, and we each were something the other needed. 

But it was your mother that brought me round in the end. Looked up at me with those big dark eyes of hers and said, "I want him to be with good people, Owen. With family." 

You've that pleading way of looking at a body, the same way she had. She was beautiful, your mother--a little soft slip of a girl, in her fancy off-world clothes, and a way of holding herself like a queen. But for all she was some big-shot outlander, she was a true woman under it all, with a kind heart like my Beru. I reckon if she thought we were the best people to raise her boy, then we'd have to do it. I don't think she wanted Kenobi to have you any more than I did. 

Here you come down into the house at last, rummaging though the kitchen— you're hungry, and small wonder when you left half your tea in a fit of the sulks. You jump guiltily at the sight of me, than put on your best innocent face. You're up to something, I can see it. I only hope it's not some bantha-brained scheme to run off to the Academy. 

Oh, son, I only want what's best for you, and if it means thwarting you now, then I will. You're so much like your father, and I don't want you ending up the same way he did. That's why I'm keeping you away from Ben Kenobi and the Imperial Academy and anywhere else where you might learn more than is good for you. As far as you're concerned, Anakin was a two-bit navigator on a spice freighter, and there's an end of it. You're the closest I'll ever have to a son, and I hate remembering that you're his boy too. 

"Go to bed, Luke. You'll have a long day tomorrow." 

"G;'night, Uncle Owen," you mumble through a mouthful of corn porridge. You still look shifty, but I decide to ignore it. 

"Long; day tomorrow, Luke," I repeat as you walk away down the passage. 

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	2. Part 2: Beru

Son of My Heart  
  
  
Disclaimer: It's all Uncle George's sandpit. I am making no money from these fics; they are solely for my pleasure and that of anyone who wants to read them. All characters copyright Lucasfilm.   
  
  
Usually I have to wake you, but this morning you're up before Owen and me—not only up, but dressed and in the kitchen pulling out my biscuit drawer. You turn a bright face on me as I stumble sleepily into the kitchen.   
  
"What are you doing up so early, Luke?"   
  
You mumble something in which I make out the words "new droids" and "South ridge".   
  
"It's good to see you so eager to work, my dear."   
  
You flush at the compliment and look at the floor guiltily. Either you're still feeling bad about last night's argument and want to make amends, or you've got yourself in more trouble that I don't yet know about. Probably it's more trouble, because arguments happen pretty regularly now. Owen's in the wrong, I know it—how many years now has he said "just one more season"?   
  
You can't stay here for ever, much as I wish you would. Find a nice girl, settle down and take over the farm when Owen and I are gone—that narrow life would never satisfy you. You're a dreamer, flying through the stars where Owen and I have our feet planted firmly on the sand. But I always knew I wouldn't have you for ever, that you were in a sense loaned to me. And you filled my empty arms and heart, and I loved you.   
  
Padmé was crying as she left you, looking back over her shoulder as she walked to her ship. How she had the strength to do it, and not run back and tear you out of my arms, I'll never know. I couldn't have done it.   
  
And so she entrusted you to me, to love and care for as best I could. Now you are all but grown, ready to fly the nest. It's with an ache at my heart that I fill you a flask of blue milk—for who knows how many more times I'll do this for you?   
  
I watch you as you walk to the door, where I see your speeder waiting. The shiny new protocol droid is sitting in the seat—much like old Threepio, if Threepio had had gold plating instead of rusty steel.   
  
"See you later," you say, paused for a moment in the doorway with the suns rising behind you. Suddenly, you turn back and kiss me smartly on the cheek. I smile at the boyish caress and smooth your hair. You say awkwardly, "I love you, Aunt Beru."   
  
I'm surprised at that; with typical Tatooine reserve, we rarely say these things, no matter how much we may feel them.   
  
"I love you too, Luke," I reply. Oh, how I love you, my beautiful boy, son of my heart, my borrowed child!   
  
You're gone now, speeding off into the sunsrise, far too fast as usual. And I turn away and begin to prepare breakfast, as the new day breaks. 


End file.
